§20. The Parts of Speech

Words are divided into eight Parts of Speech: Nouns, Adjectives (including Participles), Pronouns, Verbs, Adverbs, Prepositions, Conjunctions, and Interjections.

a. A Noun is the name of a person, place, thing, or idea: as, Caesar; Rōma, Rome; domus, a house; virtūs, virtue.

Names of particular persons and places are called Proper Nouns; other nouns are called Common.

b. An Adjective is a word that attributes a quality: as, bonus, good; fortis, brave, strong.

c. A Pronoun is a word used to distinguish a person, place, thing, or idea without either naming or describing it: as, is, he; quī, who; nōs, we.

Nouns and pronouns are often called Substantives.

d. A Verb is a word which is capable of asserting something: as, sum, I am; amat, he loves.

e. An Adverb is a word used to express the time, place, or manner of an assertion or attribute: as, splendidē mendāx, gloriously false; hodiē nātus est, he was born to-day.

f. A Preposition is a word which shows the relation between a noun or pronoun and some other word or words in the same sentence: as, per agrōs it, he goes over the fields; ē plūribus ūnum, one out of many.

g. A Conjunction is a word which connects words, or groups of words, without affecting their grammatical relations: as, et, and; sed, but.

h. Interjections are mere exclamations and are not strictly to be classed as parts of speech. Thus,—heus, halloo! ō, oh!